


moonlight and secrets

by Lady_Slytherin



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F, Getting Together, Red Beauty Week, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-27
Updated: 2016-05-27
Packaged: 2018-07-10 12:10:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6984526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Slytherin/pseuds/Lady_Slytherin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Belle sneaks out with a beautiful girl, and the world tilts slightly on its axis. There's moonlight reflecting on water and everything feels like the first chapter to a story she never wants to put down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	moonlight and secrets

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Red Beauty Week 2k16 for the theme Secret Relationship. Shoutout to OnTheCyberSeas for betaing.

It was dark outside of Belle’s window. She hadn’t realized how late it was, too caught up in her book to notice, but looking up now, she realized that the sun had definitely set. She sighed, gently picking up a bookmark from her side table and preparing for bed. She was digging through a drawer for her pajamas when a sharp _tap_ caught her attention. Belle cocked her head toward the window, waiting, and it happened again. She went to investigate.

Ruby Lucas was standing outside her house, bathed in moonlight and holding a pebble as though she were about to throw it. “I snuck out,” she said in a carrying whisper. “Want to join me?”

“Is Merida or Mulan coming?” Belle asked, leaning as far out of the window as she dared. She couldn’t see what Ruby was doing _here,_ when they’d never spent time together outside of the presence of their other friends.

“No, they’re doing their own thing tonight,” Ruby said. She dropped the pebble. “I didn’t want to be a third wheel, so I came to see what you were up to.”

Belle took a deep breath. She’d never snuck out before, but Ruby looked so beautiful, standing outside of her window and looking like the inciting incident of every book Belle had ever read. “Okay,” she said. “Only we can’t get caught. Go wait at the end of the block, I’ll meet you there.”

Sneaking out of the house was surprisingly easy; Belle wondered why she had never done it before. As she passed her father’s room, she could hear him snoring, and the front door was too well maintained to make a sound when she opened it. By the time she left the house she felt light, as though everything difficult had been scooped out of her. 

“Hi,” she said as she reached the corner where Ruby was standing. Belle couldn’t stop the smile from forming on her face. “So, um, where were you thinking of going?”

“The waterfront,” Ruby said at once. “There’s nobody there at night, I know because I like to go running there. It’ll be nice and peaceful.”

“You go running in the middle of the night?”

Ruby shrugged. “Sometimes, yeah. It clears my head.” She started walking, arms swinging loosely at her side. Her legs were long, but Belle found that she could keep up surprisingly easily.

“So,” Ruby said after a few moments. “Are you ready to graduate tomorrow? I mean, not the actual graduating part, but all the scary life stuff that comes with it?”

The abrupt introduction of a new subject startled Belle, and she took a moment to think about her answer. “I’m ready to be somewhere new,” she finally said, feeling that at least this was something she was certain about. “There’s so much world outside of Storybrooke. I want to experience that.”

“It’ll be nice to meet people who haven’t known us since we were two,” Ruby agreed. “Not that I’ll be doing much of that working in the diner. One of Granny’s friends pinched my cheek the other day, can you believe that?”

“You’re not going to college?” Belle asked.

Ruby looked away. “No. I got into the University of Maine but I deferred for a year.”

“Why? If you don’t mind me asking, of course.”

Ruby just shrugged. “What about you?” she asked. “You’re going to some fancy school, right? Harvard or Yale or something? I heard you and Mulan talking about it.”

“I’m going to Colombia,” Belle said. A heavy feeling of guilt settled over her. Whenever she’d pictured Ruby in the future, she pictured her doing something fabulous in a big city far away from here. Maybe designing clothes, or modeling. Anything, as long as it was something where she got to shine. What she hadn’t pictured was Ruby staying in Storybrooke, working at her grandmother’s diner. It didn’t seem fair, somehow.

They reached the dock and walked along it for a little while. Finally, Ruby sat down, legs dangling off the edge. “I think this is a good spot,” she said. 

Belle sat down next to her. “I’m sorry you don’t get to go away for school,” she said.

“It’s not a big deal,” Ruby said quickly. “Besides, people who go away always end up losing track of people they care about. They grow apart or something. If I’m here, I don’t have to risk that. Speaking of which, what do you think will happen to Mulan and Merida? I mean, they’ll be on separate continents next year since Merida’s doing the whole study abroad thing. Do you think their relationship will survive? I mean, I want them to be together, but do you really think long distance relationships can work?”

Belle looked down. “I wouldn’t know. I’ve, um, never been in a relationship.”

“Oh.” Ruby didn’t sound judgmental, but the surprise in her voice made Belle want to change the topic as quickly as possible. 

“I think Mulan and Merida are good for each other, though,” she said. “If I were in a relationship, I’d want it to be like that. They treat each other much better than couples in books tend to.”

“Yeah, book couples always treat each other like shit,” Ruby said. She pulled one of her legs back on the dock and tucked it under herself. “I’ve always wondered by writers do that.”

“Me too.”

“So, how come you’ve never dated anyone?” Ruby asked. 

Belle tried to keep her tone lighthearted. “Oh, you know. My father won’t let me date anyone he hasn’t approved of.”

“Why do you have to listen to him?” 

This question had never occurred to her. “I don’t know,” she said after a moment of reflection.

“Fair enough. So,” Ruby said, tapping her fingers on the dock as though nervous. “What sort of person _would_ Moe French approve of?” 

“Rich,” Belle said automatically. She was surprised by the bitterness in her own tone.

“Gender a factor at all?” Ruby asked. 

“Probably not,” Belle said. “He doesn’t know that I’m bisexual, but I’m sure he’d be perfectly happy with me dating a woman as long as it would advance his own interests. Regina Mills might be acceptable, I suppose.” 

Ruby wrinkled her nose. “The trust fund chick? No way.”

“Maybe not,” Belle said. “I’ve never bothered to ask for his approval on anyone, so I’m not sure who he’d like. He—well, the two of us don’t really like the same sort of people. I’ve never had a crush on anyone I thought he might approve of.”

“Oh.”

They sat quietly for a moment, Belle wishing she could think of something to say that wouldn’t sound stupid. She’d spent weeks wondering what would happen if she ever got to be alone with Ruby, and now that she was she couldn’t remember a single one of her imagined conversation topics.

After a little while, Ruby put her head in Belle’s lap. “Play with my hair,” she ordered.

Belle laughed, but complied. “Are you this demanding with all your friends?” she asked. Mulan and Merida didn’t seem like the type to play with someone’s hair, but Ruby had lots of friends that Belle was less well-acquainted with. Anyway, it was something to say.

“Nah, just the cute ones.”

Belle could feel herself turning red. “You’re pretty cute too,” she managed to say. Her fingers felt clumsy, but they continued their movement through Ruby’s hair. A second later, she blurted out, “Why did you invite me out tonight? I mean, not that I’m not glad to be here—it just seems like, last day of school and all, you’d want to be out partying or something.”

Ruby sat up. “Is that what you think of me?” she asked quietly. “That I’m always out partying?”

“No,” Belle said quickly. “I don’t mean—I wasn’t trying to insult you, or anything. I was just surprised you picked me to spend your night with when I’m sure you got better offers from other people.” Things like this weren’t supposed to happen outside of books. Nobody’s crush ever stood outside their window with rocks in real life waiting to sneak out. There was no way explain to Ruby the impossibility of it all, how this evening had veered off course and she was happy but couldn’t understand what had happened.

“I didn’t want the other offers. I wanted to see you.” Ruby pulled her knees to her chest, wrapping her arm loosely around it. “We only ever hang out around other people, I wanted to see what it would be like when it was just me and you. I just—I’ve always wanted to get to know you better, but it’s never felt like there was a chance.”

“Oh.”

“I know I should have said something sooner. We could have been hanging out for weeks by now.”

“I could just as easily have reached out to you,” Belle pointed out. “I also wanted to be your friend, you know.”

“Yeah?” Ruby asked, giving her a hopeful smile.

“Yes. I’ll even let you put your head back in my lap if you like.” Belle blushed immediately at how it sounded.

Ruby laughed and laid back down. “We _should_ have done this sooner,” she said. “There’s not very much time left now.”

“We have the summer.”

“Yeah, but after that you’ll be going away for college,” Ruby said. Her voice took on a more cheerful tone, but it was strained. “You’re lucky to be going somewhere you won’t know anyone,” she said. “You could reinvent yourself if you wanted to. Create a whole new identity or something.”

Belle’s fingers returned to Ruby’s hair. “Reinvent myself how?”

“Let’s see. Well, you could pretend to be French and smoke cigarettes out of those long holders and talk about that existential philosopher you like.”

“Simone de Beauvoir?”

“Yeah, her.”

“I think people would _probably_ notice that French is my last name and think it was weird if it was my nationality as well,” Belle said, laughing.

Ruby laughed too. “You could always change your last name. Or your first name. Ooh, you could start going by your middle name or something.”

“Lacey?”

“Yeah.” Ruby gestured dramatically. “Lacey French, ready to take the world by storm.”

Belle laughed. “I suppose it’s an idea.” 

“You can tell me it’s stupid,” Ruby said cheerfully. “I won’t mind.”

“It’s not stupid,” Belle said. She looked out at the moonlight reflecting on the water. “I’m just not sure I want to be anybody but me. I want to go to college to find myself, not to become someone else. I’ve spent all of this time having to live up to everyone else’s expectations of me. I just want to know what my own expectations are.”

Ruby’s eyes flickered to her lips. For a moment, Belle wondered if Ruby was about to kiss her, but then she looked away and said, “Has anyone ever told you you’re kind of amazing?”

“What do you mean?”

“You just have such a strong idea of how you want to live your life. I wish I was like that.” Ruby’s voiced had dropped very low, so that it was almost a whisper. “Do you want to know the real reason I’m not leaving next year?” 

“Only if you want to tell me.”

“I do.” Ruby swallowed hard. “You’re going to think it’s stupid, though. I’m not going away because I got scared to leave home. I’ve spent so much time thinking about it, and then the time came to decide where I was going to go, and I just couldn’t do it. Granny was the one who suggested I defer, she knew how freaked out I was.”

“Oh.” Belle didn’t know what else to say. If Ruby was scared of leaving home— _Ruby,_ the girl who talked back to teachers and threw rocks at girls’ windows and didn’t care what people said about her behind her back— if she was scared, what hope did the rest of them have? 

“It’s stupid, I know.”

“It’s not,” Belle said softly. Without thinking, she reached down touched Ruby’s face. Ruby closed her eyes and leaned into the touch. “I think everyone gets scared about the future. Especially when it means big changes.”

After a moment, Ruby nodded. “Yeah, maybe.”

Belle’s heart was speeding up. She didn’t know if it would be appropriate to change the subject, when Ruby had just told her something so personal, but they were so close together now, and she had to know the answer. “Earlier, when you asked who my father would approve of me dating—why did you want to know?”

Ruby sat up, which knocked Belle’s hand away from her face. Her eyes flew open. “What?”

“I mean, did you want to know because—“ Belle took a deep breath. “Because you thought you might be interested?”

“Belle…”

“Because if you are,” Belle said, cutting her off. “I’d really like to kiss you right now.”

Ruby let out a tiny gasp, then leaned in a fraction of an inch. Belle closed the rest of the distance, hands returning to Ruby’s hair. She’d never kissed anyone before, but somehow her body knew what to do, the right way to move her lips. Too soon, Ruby pulled away and stared at her.

“Was that okay?” Belle asked her.

“Yeah, it was.” Ruby’s breath came out shakily. “It’s just— _damn,_ I’m going to miss you when you go to college.”

“Me too. I wish we’d gotten to know one another sooner.” _And kissed sooner,_ Belle thought, her lips still tingling from the contact.

“I should have said yes to U of Maine,” Ruby said, running her fingernails along her leg. “Now everyone but me is leaving and I’m stuck working at the diner for a year, and everybody’s going to want to know why and I won’t know what to tell them.”

“You don’t have to tell them anything. It isn’t really their business.”

“Yeah, but I can’t stop them from wondering about it.”

Belle grabbed her hands. “Then decide something to do. Figure out how you’re going to spend the year, and tell people it was the plan all along. Maybe your gap year doesn’t have to be a waste,” she said. “You can come up and visit me, my father’s insisted on getting me an apartment instead of letting me live in the dorms. And I bet Mulan would let you visit her at Smith, and if you can afford to go to Scotland to visit Merida on her study abroad she’d probably let you. You can take some time and actually decide what you want!”

“Belle, touring more colleges isn’t going to tell me what I want.”

“No, but travelling might. Or you could take classes online, learn a language or something. Maybe you’ll find something you want to do that isn’t college. Just please don’t sit around all year working and the diner and feeling sorry for yourself.”

Ruby chewed on her lip. “You really want me to come and visit you?”

“Yes.”

There was a prolonged pause. “Okay,” Ruby said. “That’s what I’ll do then. I’ll work at the diner and visit you and try to get my shit figured out. Granny will probably help if I ask her.”

“I’m sure she will.”

Ruby leaned in to kiss her again. Belle slid her hands up Ruby’s arms for balance, feeling as though she were falling. It didn’t terrify her the way it should have. She knew that no matter how far she fell, there would be somebody to catch her.

“So what are we, exactly?” Belle asked when they separated. She blushed. “I mean, in terms of our relationship. Since we keep kissing and everything, maybe we should put a name to what we’re doing.”

“What do you want to be?” Ruby asked. “It doesn’t have to be anything serious. We could always just be friends who make out.” She didn’t make eye contact as she said this, instead looking away at the water.

“No, I don’t think that’s what I want,” Belle said slowly. All she could do now was tell the truth and hope they were on the same page. “I don’t think I’d be very happy in a casual sort of relationship. But if you wanted to, I’d love to be your girlfriend. I know I’m going away in the fall, but maybe we could work something out anyway.”

Ruby’s eyes lit up. “Really? But what about your dad? If we start dating he’s going to find out somehow, and then I might not be allowed to see you.”

“We could just not tell anyone,” Belle suggested. Maybe it was a terrible idea, she couldn’t be sure. What she _was_ sure of was the way her body had unconsciously relaxed as their bodies touched. “For the summer, at least. When you visit me in New York we won’t have to hide it, but that doesn’t mean we have to wait until then, does it?”

Ruby smiled. “Are _you_ the one talking _me_ into breaking rules?”

“Only my father’s awful ones.”

“I’ll do it,” Ruby said, threading her fingers through Belle’s. “I think I’d like to tell Granny, though. She won’t tell your dad if I tell her not to.”

“That sounds nice,” Belle said. “I’ve always liked your grandmother.” A large yawn escaped her mouth.

Ruby laughed. “It’s probably pretty late, isn’t it?” she asked. “I forgot to bring my phone, I can’t check the time.”

“I forgot mine, too.”

“Want to head back, then? We wouldn’t want your dad to wake up and get worried.”

“Probably should,” Belle said.

Ruby pulled Belle to her feet. “I’ll walk you home,” she said, keeping a firm hold on her hand. They didn’t speak on the way back, but stole glances at each other out of the corners of their eyes. Belle couldn’t remember ever feeling this alive. 

One block away from Belle’s house, Ruby stopped and turned to look at her. “I’ll see you tomorrow at graduation,” she said. 

The street was bathed in moonlight, the mood like the final song on a mixtape you never wanted to end. Belle nodded, arms moving up so they were around Ruby’s shoulders, and kissed her squarely on the mouth. Ruby’s hands held her hips gently, pressing their bodies together for a moment. Reluctantly, they separated.

“See you tomorrow,” Ruby whispered, and then she was off. 

Belle walked slowly the rest of the way to her house. Before she entered, she stopped to look at the stars. She almost closed her eyes and made a wish, but realized she’d rather just stand there and look at them one last time before going inside of the house.


End file.
